Of This Cup
by Herenes
Summary: When you no longer have to fight the monsters in front of you, how do you fight the ones inside you? Sometimes the road ahead is very troubled and very dark especially when the one you've asked to share it with you doesn't really understand what's going on. Written for the Livejournal taking turns community in 2010


There is something perverse about me, I know. A lot of people tell me that, including my wife. Or 'stubborn'. Or 'annoying'. 'Wilfully destructive' is another one, as is 'in need of help'. Hermione, bless her cotton socks, is fond of that one. My wife has a bit more empathy; only a bit, mind.

And they're all wrong.

The game finished about three hours ago, and even allowing for dealing with the press and having a few celebratory drinks afterwards, she should have been home by now. The bottle on the sideboard beckons, but the pain and the anger will still be there however much I try to numb it. Plus, the bottle has other uses. Better uses. So it stays there, untouched. Anyway, why waste a perfectly good bottle of Firewhisky on getting shit-faced when a cheap bottle of plonk will do the job just as well and for a fraction of the price?

Not that we have any bottles of plonk around these days.

"It's only a couple of glasses," said I.

"They all add up," said she, crossing the vin-de-pays off the list before attaching it to the owl.

She loves me, really. I know this because she says it. But also because she hasn't walked out on me yet. Oh, I know she's thought about it; I can see it in her eyes and hear it in her voice when she discusses my latest crisis. But she's still here, and I am, I think, getting better.

Who'd have thought that, in the aftermath of Voldemort's demise, my nemesis would be not the memories of the death and destruction at Hogwarts, but the years I spent being belittled by my uncle? Of course my old mate Tom is still there, doing his best. But he's dead.

Again.

And Vernon, that porcine personification of prejudice, is still around.

He's a wanker. I know that. The biggest tosspot this side of … well, everywhere, but …

I can't finish the sentence because I don't know the answer. Ignoring the obvious plaudits from a _grateful nation -_ this is what it says on my Order of Merlin with Oak Leaves citation - people that matter, people that count like Hermione and Ron and especially Ginny tell me that I am the greatest thing since sliced bread. That although I have my moments, I _am_ worthy of their love and their affection and, like it or not, deserving of the public praise I get. Do I not see that I am no longer the small, terrified boy standing in front of my uncle trying to stop crying so he doesn't carry out his threat to 'give me something to cry about'?

Actually I don't see. Which is why I grab my travelling cloak and my wand and go wandering. Or wondering. I'm never sure which it is.

HJPGMW

Some nights I'm playing hide and seek with my past as I Apparate across the country, charging back and forth, trying to remember all the places we stayed that year. Where did I meet Dean and Ted Tonks? Where did Ron leave and where did he come back? Sometimes I can find the lake, sometimes it eludes me. Sometimes I swear I can see the silver doe that led me to the Sword of Gryffindor. Snape, Ron, Hermione, Neville and Ginny all did their bit, so why do I get the praise?

"You get the praise," says a voice that sounds like Ginny's but isn't, "because you didn't run away."

If you say so. But you're wrong. After all, what am I doing now?

Sometimes I find myself in Godric's Hollow. I don't visit my parents' house, not alone and certainly not in the dark. Instead, I go to Bathilda's and remember. How close I came. How stupid and how lucky I was.

It's easy to let myself into the church despite the locks and alarms, and I can sit for hours on one of the pews, enjoying the silence. Even my thoughts stop racing when I breathe in the serenity that has seeped into the ancient stonework over the centuries. Thousands of prayers, even those unheeded and unanswered, have added to the feeling of sanctuary. The heartfelt cries that echo across the years, the outpourings of despair and anger, and the tears of frustration and pathos, together with the songs and shouts of praise have built, word by word, tear by tear, breath by breath, a home for the hopeless, the bone-weary and the despairing. Built a home for me. Ish.

Each time I come here some of the darkness lifts, sucked off into the stillness that will brook no resistance. Even the vilest of memories, the most hateful of nightmares are overwhelmed and overcome by the echoes of the Almighty.

Sometimes all I want to do is press my head to the stone floor, the coolness an antidote to the raging fire within. Other times I sit and stare at the stained glass and wonder at the man in robes and a beard transfiguring and conjuring and being hailed as a god. Or God.

Whatever or whoever he was - or was it is? - the parallels are striking. He who died and rose again and who was worshiped and adored had the good sense to bugger off to wherever he came from when it became too much. I, on the other hand, have to grin and bear it.

It's all there, his story, on the stained glass windows. At night they're dull and lifeless, but in the daylight they cast a kaleidoscope of light on the austere interior, a wonderful counterpoint to the dominant wood and stone. Tonight, my eyes settle on his last meal. The Last Supper: the wine and the bread, the blood and the body. Given, not taken. Broken but not bowed. Consumed but not conquered.

"Can you drink of this cup?"

A cup of suffering.

When I arrive home, there are two flickering candles on the kitchen table to greet me. Next to them is a bottle of Firewhisky and two glasses. One, with a smudge of lipstick on the rim, is empty, and the other is full. The ensemble is completed by a wand, abandoned by its owner as a gesture of friendship and maybe more.

HJPGMW

No one can slam a door quite like my wife. She manages to convey all her anger and disappointment so succinctly in an action few believe possesses anything other than brute force, let alone the nuances of male/female communication.

And when it slams like that, I know better than to wait for her return. I set the glasses and candles out on the table. After I pour a double for each of us, I take the Snitch – the one that was there at the end - and place it on the table in front of the glasses. A flick of my wand and the two candles are in place, their charmed wicks awaiting the fall of night to light themselves.

Quite why we go through such an elaborate song and dance to argue I have no idea. I don't know why we don't just throw things at each other. And then I remember that my wife is a Chaser, and a bloody good one at that, so … Well, you get the idea.

I am not in the mood for reflection, contemplation or any other 'ation'. The locked doors of St John's Godric's Hollow will remain undisturbed tonight. I have other plans, other destinations, and other emotions to be tended to.

I've been here before, in the day time. It's a nice beach, secluded, a bugger to get to if you can't Apparate. We've spent many a quiet afternoon here, Ginny and me. Of course, she doesn't know what is to be found just beyond the curve of the bay, past the seaside village, where the sand is replaced by dark, forbidding rocks. It's a scene of many firsts for me: my first Horcrux, my first Apparition and the first time we made love in the open air.

It may be my perverse nature - that word again - but I like the fact that we've made this hell-hole so special. Okay, not the actual place, but as near as you can get if you don't have a death wish. Which is why I'm hovering above the foaming rocks, fighting the wind on my broom rather than unpacking a picnic and looking forward to seeing my wife in a bikini. Perverse, see? I told you. Or perhaps not. It's not summer anyway.

The water is as cold as ever – it is December after all - but it doesn't take me long to find my way into the middle of the cave, remembering my conversation with Dumbledore.

The cut I make is larger than needed to gain entrance but not as large as I'd like. There is a feeling of satisfaction as the point of the blade pierces my palms, releasing the bright red fluid that is my penance and my passport to the horrors beyond. I'll heal it before I leave, but until then I am content to be wounded for my transgressions.

The cave does not change, only my perceptions. This is no temple to one man's humility, so there are no painstakingly assembled windows to the world outside. This is but a monument to arrogance, folly and failure. The silence I once found so disturbing is now a comfort. But it is the lull before the storm and not the path to peace.

I can find the boat without even thinking about it, and even though there are other ways to get to the island, this is the one I must take. Tradition must be observed in this time of remembrance and reflection.

For a while I sit on the flat, dark stone, allowing myself to be numbed by the cold. In my mind the battle begins, hidden from even the long-dead eyes that float in the water around me. My inner demons begin to disturb the stoicism of my thoughts long before the husks of the fallen have churned the dark water around me into a many-limbed horror.

My hour has come and, after rising to my feet and conjuring the goblet, I approach the stone bowl. For a moment I long for another way. Can this cup pass? Knowing it can't, I take it and begin to drink, using the same crystal goblet from that fateful night.

The nightmares start almost immediately, but they are no worse than those that stalked my pre-Hogwarts years. Even after the fourth gobletful I experience no more than that which Voldemort managed to plant in my mind.

And then I find myself falling, plummeting down into the darkness that is mine and mine alone. I feel the fear, the pain and the rejection. The sharpness of my aunt's derision, the pain from Dudley's chubby fingers and the lingering hurt of my empty stocking at Christmastime.

It goes on, getting worse with each sip. Reality fades and the pain of my twenty-three years is all I know. Each accusing face, each lifeless body, each disappointed look from Ginny pulls me deeper and deeper until I am in the place I have sought.

I can drink no more. I can cry no more. The darkness and the pain do not purge my guilt, my anger or my misery. They mock me, tell me there is no release, no way out. My days will always be imprisoned by the past, a hostage to my mistakes, forever paying for those I failed.

But the bowl is empty, and Regulus' faux Horcrux is now in my hands. It starts with a ripple, but soon the water around me is a sea of hands and heads. As I stand, they start their doomed journey towards me. Their number, like my dark sojourn, is unending. But like those who have gone before them, from whose parts they have been made, their fate is sealed before even one spell leaves my wand.

One moment there is darkness; the next there is light, blinding light. Then the cavern is engulfed in fire and the lofty ceiling echoes to the sound of corpses exploding, of body parts being splattered against rock.

I fight, unthinking, powered by rage. Here, I am free from constraints. There are no smirking Death Eaters to taunt me as I limit myself to stunners and non-lethal curses. No petty bureaucrats trying to haul me before the Wizengamot for minor infringements of a killer's rights. And no Vernon Dursley

In the darkest corners of my soul, there is no condemnation, but neither is there peace. There is no release in my suffering, no trace of the Divine.

And suddenly there are no Inferi.

The cave is filled with light. Not a blinding, destructive rage-filled conflagration, but a warm, reassuring, even homely luminescence. My energy gone, I fall to my knees. And as tears I had thought long gone fill my eyes, I notice a discarded broomstick and the feet of its owner.

Nothing is said as wracking sobs overwhelm me. No words of comfort interrupt my grieving, and I am left to deal with the unspoken condemnation that the silence represents.

"How long?" she asks as the tears eventually subside.

"Long enough," I reply flatly, still resenting the distance between us.

"You didn't say."

"You didn't ask."

She kneels down and conjures a familiar crystal goblet. With a tap of her wand it fills with sparkling water. She offers it to me.

"Can you drink?"

I take it from her, and before putting it to my lips I say, "Can you drink the cup I am going to drink?"

There is silence. And then with a sigh I begin to slake my thirst. Each swallow takes me further from her, and I am surprised when she takes the empty chalice from me.

I watch as she walks over to the bowl, dips the cup into the emerald liquid and raises it to her lips.

"Yes, Harry, I can."


End file.
